Villains Aren't Stepping Stones!

Xu Xiansu was inside the titanic, dark mouth of the fallen three-legged Golden Crow, a creature of myth whose size rivaled an entire star, now lying dead upon the scarred Eastern Region battlefield.

She had crawled deep within, seeking the primal core of its power, using its remaining rapidly dissipating warmth along with the viscous, glowing golden essence blood to awaken her long-dormant, legendary physique.

The air inside the maw was thick with the scent of roasted meat and ancient, potent divinity, a heat that would have vaporized any lesser cultivator instantly.

She felt that familiar, excoriating burning sensation from her past life begin to take hold.

Her blood was actively boiling within her veins, sizzling against her muscle walls, and her innards felt as if they were getting cooked by a concentrated solar flare.

Every nerve ending was a conductor of absolute agony, a testament to the fact that divine power was not granted, but forged in the fires of suffering.

But her expression didn’t even as much as twitch in the harrowing darkness.

Despite the internal conflagration that threatened to turn her to ash, she was still sitting cross-legged, maintaining a perfect, stable meditative pose that defied the chaotic physical reality of her body.

Having had five hundred years of experience, her willpower has long since become a tempered blade, holding her core together against the tide of primordial energy that sought to consume her.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity of endurance, the excruciating pain began to subside, replaced by a profound, terrifying rush of power coursing through her newly reforged veins.

In that monumental moment of completion, the awakening did not go unnoticed, and instead, it sent a sudden, destabilizing ripples throughout all existence, vibrating through the spiritual aether of the world.

Supremes who are hiding and in deep seclusion within their forbidden dimensions felt the cosmic tremor immediately.

Their eyes, ancient and full of stars, looked up with a mixture of shock and recognition.

”This familiar, ancient sensation... a tremor that could only mean one thing,” whispered an ancient being hidden in the void. ”The awakening of a Divine Physique! A true dragon is rising in the East!”

*Boom!*

Back on the physical battlefield, the colossal, hollowed-out corpse of the Golden Crow suddenly exploded without warning, a colossal, fiery burst that sent colossal, glowing bone fragments raining down like meteorites.

Shen Haoran, who was standing at a safe distance felt his own unique physique violently reacting to the blast, a sudden resonance that surprised him.

Even the highly secretive and sealed Formless Void Divine Physique he had kept hidden within the deepest layers of his storage space was getting restless, thrumming with a bizarre, hungry energy.

”The hell?” Shen Ji murmured, his eyes narrowing into thin, dangerous slits as he maintained his focus.

”What was that? What is happening!?” shouted another genius, his usual poise vanished in the face of the sudden explosion.

”The corpse exploded, you blind fool!” barked the muscle-bound Jin CI, who was already beginning to regret their moment of lapse.

”We have eyes, of course we saw that! The question is, what came out of it!?”

At that exact moment, from the thick, swirling black dust that gathered due to the explosive release of energy, a silhouette slowly emerged.

She was an ethereal vision that seemed to push back the grime and gloom of the battlefield.

Long, lustrous black hair that seemed to absorb the twilight cascade down to her waist.

Her previously human eyes had been completely transformed; they were now two burning, bright orange suns, filled with an unmoving, royal heat.

She carried a majestic and inherently noble feel with every step she took—an internal royalty that made the cowering Xu Xiaojun look like a common street peasant.

It was Xu Xiansu, though changed beyond all recognition from the meek abandoned princess she had been.

Behind her, the previously titanic corpse of the Golden Crow, once a structure of myth, had been reduced to nothing more than a giant, brittle pile of white bones.

Unlike in her past life, this time she had completely and entirely absorbed every drop of its divine essence, its lineage, and its power!

Because of that, she had achieved the impossible: not only had she successfully awakened her long-dormant Sun Moon Divine Physique, but the influx of pure solar energy had also pushed her past the limits of mortal progression.

She had also broken through to the absolute peak of the Core Formation Realm in a single major leap!

A breakthrough of a full major realm, bypassing years, or decades, of arduous cultivation, leaving the nearby geniuses gaping in stunned disbelief.

”Who’s that? She looks incredibly powerful,” one of the sect disciples asked, his voice full of fear as he looked at the regal aura radiating from the woman.

”Does anyone know her? Where did she come from?”

”Hey, isn’t that the girl who likes to hide at the back?”

”Now that you mention it...”

Haoran stared at Xu Xiansu, and without as much as a word, he walked slowly towards the glowing figure, his golden eyes observing the sudden, tectonic shift in her karmic thread.

Xu Xiansu watched as he approached, but said nothing.

Finally, he stood before her, his massive stature towering over her.

”It seems,” he spoke, his voice calm and unbothered as ever, ”that despite my dominance, you’re the one who actually benefited the most in this war.”

Xu Xiansu clenched her fists, her knuckles turning white, but she maintained her new, stoic expression.

She did not dare let any of her internal turmoil show. ”I was just incredibly lucky, young master. I was searching for shelter from the fallout and found the core by accident.”

”Young master?” Haoran snorted in a low, dangerous tone of amusement.

Just then, he brought his face closer to hers, until she could smell that familiar, musky scent of a man that constantly emanated from his skin.

A familiar scent that made her mind almost go blank.

”Susu, do you really, honestly, think I can’t recognise you, regardless of how many years since we last saw each other?”

Xu Xiansu froze. Her internal composure, recently forged in the fire of the Golden Crow, began to crack.

As expected, he recognised her!

He always did!

This is bad...

She should be angry! She should be filled with an eternal, burning hatred for the man who tortured and killed her! This is the moment to reveal her power and strike him down!

Yet... yet... why was her heart pounding like a drum in her chest? Why was a foreign warmth spreading through her body?

Why does she feel so genuinely happy, so deeply relieved, that he still recognized her?!

Why was her Sun Moon Physique resonating with his presence instead of repelling it?!

”Haoran...” She spoke, her voice thick, layering her tone with so much carefully constructed hatred that it almost felt real.

”What you have done to me... I will repay it a hundredfold! I will drag you to the hell I came from!”

Haoran chuckled in amusement as he leaned in towards her, until his lips brushed against her luscious black hair. ”Really, Susu? Then come to my room after the celebration. I’ll be generous and allow you to be on top this time.”

Xu Xiansu blinked, her bright orange eyes looking completely confused at first as her naive soul, though thousands of years old in experience, had never encountered such casual flirtation from the man who had always been a source of pain.

But then, when she saw that specific, knowing smirk on his face, the look of a cat about to enjoy a very specific mouse she immediately blushed, her orange eyes widening as she finally realized his direct implications.

”Not like that you bastard! I meant I would break your limbs, not... not... that!”

”Hey! Why are you cursing my man!”

Just then, Huo Yue suddenly appeared, her long crimson hair seemingly flaring up in anger as she stepped protectively in front of Haoran, glaring at the ’stranger’ with a look of supreme offense.

She was standing right there, how dare some upstart from a pile of bones curse her fiancé?

Xu Xiansu glared back at Huo Yue, a sharp pang of possessive jealousy flashing through her Sun Moon eyes.

This girl really doesn’t know what’s good for her! Here I am, wanting her to have a good life by taking Haoran and enduring his brutality so she doesn’t have to, yet she doesn’t appreciate my good intentions?!

She doesn’t understand that Haoran is a void that will eventually consume her!

Bah! All my admirations and awe for the heroic Flame Empress in her past life was for nothing!

This woman is a fool for love!

I hope Haoran abandon you so that you can learn your lesson to be with a bad man!

”What are you looking at!?” Huo Yue felt her flames spike, genuinely offended seeing Xu Xiansu, this total stranger, staring at her with such palpable disdain. ”You want to fight? I’ll turn you to glass, you freak!”

Xu Xiansu immediately turned her head away, taking a stabilizing breath.

Not now. Not now. She cannot confront Huo Yue right now.

She knew, from hundreds of years of memory, that this woman was incredibly broken.

As someone who possessed that Cultivation technique and would one day even create the infamous Burning Heaven Technique by fusing all Heavenly Flames, this woman is not to be taken lightly

Even as a Golden Core, if given enough time and motivation, Huo Yue’s four fused Heavenly Flames could severely injure or even kill weaker Spirit Ascension experts, let alone a peak Core Formation cultivator who had just finished breakthrough.

It was too dangerous to fight her until her new physique was stabilized.

”Alright, that is enough of this spectacle.” Haoran said, his command acting as a wave of cold that immediately extinguished Huo Yue’s killing intent and made Xu Xiansu’s Sun Moon aura retract.

He looked over the ruined landscape, at the millions of dead barbarians, the broken city walls, and the bound and sealed Korgar resting in his palm.

He looked at the diverse geniuses, the newly awakened girl, and the girl holding his hand.

”The war is over, and the Eastern Region has been held. It is time for a celebration, not a battle,” Haoran concluded.

The dark comedy of the war was finished; now, the true performance could begin in the banquet halls.